An Oklahoma woman scribbled the González family into her will
shortly before committing suicide last year.
By Andres Viglucci. aviglucci@herald.com. Published
Wednesday, April 25, 2001 in the Miami Herald
The Miami relatives of Elián González will receive an
undisclosed share of the estimated $500,000 estate of an Oklahoma woman who
scribbled them into her will shortly before committing suicide last year.
An Oklahoma judge, calling the bequest "the product of insane
delusions,'' earlier this year disallowed the last-minute alteration, which
deleted Anne Abernathy's 12 heirs and divided her estate between the Gonzálezes
and members of a Massachussetts family convicted years before in a controversial
child-abuse case.
But the heirs worked out a settlement last week with the Gonzálezes
and the Massachussetts family, the Amiraults, both of whom will receive a
portion of the estate. The settlement bars all parties from disclosing specific
terms. Lázaro González did not return a message requesting his
reaction.
"I think they're satisfied,'' said Manny Díaz, an attorney for
the González family, adding that the agreement precluded him from
characterizing their share of the estate. "The fact that this was her dying
wish, that the family receive some money from the estate, that's being honored.
At the same time, the heirs are recovering what they are recovering.
"It's all derived from a very sad situation, because she committed
suicide, but everyone is satisfied.''
As part of the settlement, the Gonzálezes and the Amiraults dropped
an appeal of the judge's decision that set aside Abernathy's last-minute will.
Her estate, which includes homes in Oklahoma and Texas, has been valued in court
papers at more than $500,000, but Díaz said no precise accounting of its
worth has been released.
Abernathy, 57, died of a self-inflicted gunshot just hours after her
91-year-old mother, Katrine Abernathy, died of natural causes in the home the
two shared in Shawnee.
In a note she wrote by hand in the hours before her death on July 20,
Abernathy expressed admiration for the Gonzálezes' loving treatment of
Elián and criticized the criminal case against the Amiraults as "a
scam.'' She had apparently never met either family.
Gerald Amirault, his sister, Cheryl Amirault LeFeve, and his mother, Violet
Amirault, were convicted in the 1980s of molesting children at their family-run
day-care center. The mother and daughter served a decade in prison before they
were freed on appeal. Gerald Amirault is trying to get his sentence commuted.
This report was supplemented with Herald wire services.
Copyright 2001 Miami Herald | 